Paris departed and now sat in glorious sunshine somewhere between Gaillac and Toulouse. Well, that was earlier and am now sat inside and ready for another cidre.
This plastic bottled cidre is probably a step away from the usual high quality cidre. I don’t normally ‘do’ cider in plastic bottles but I have never come across a cloudy ‘traditional’ cidre within France. The vast majority are bottle conditioned or cidre bouche, method traditionnel etc. and therefore clear to bright with little sediment. The question about this one is how close to our scrumpy does it get? Is it still and cloudy or is there some Co2 life to it?
The other thing that I notice is that this is a 1.5 litre bottle… made for sharing then. It says on the bottle that it is ‘naturallement trouble’. OK, this made me giggle a little but, while my first instinct was that it meant 'naturally fizzy' using my English expectation of the word 'trouble' it actually means naturally 'cloudy'. And I can confirm that it is that. Whether it is natural or not - well, lets not get all Westons Old Rosie on it yet shall we!
Lets see how I get on with it. Well, it is sparkling though not highly so and smells juicy, sweet and fruity. It is quite a lot fainter than the Le Brun but not a bad smell in all. It is rather cloudy and looking at it I do wonder whether this is deliberately been done or whether it is the result of a natural process (i.e. is the cloud manufactured by industrial process so that it hangs about?). My own is cloudy whilst fermenting, but soon drops clear once fermentation is complete. If that process happens in a bottle, there is sediment at the bottom – it doesn’t stay in solution.
It has a very juicy taste to it – fresh apples but very little body over and above this. It comes across as quite watery, although actually it is very refreshing – it is chilled which helps a bit. It isn’t especially sweet, which is I think where the traditional bit comes in. The French are not renowned for dry ciders and this is a nice change. I do have to say that it doesn’t compete with half the UK dry ciders though:-)
The fizz dies down fairly quickly in this cidre, and once settled I do get some tannin and a bit more acid from it. That is good as it isn’t just relying on it’s juiciness to give it character. The aftertaste is fairly long and pleasant.
As a session cider, this is rally rather nice and I would recommend it to anyone in a non cider producing region of France. Incidentally, try having a chat with a Frenchman in a wine region of France and mention that you are a cider maker… the facial expression is priceless!
A good score for this one – perhaps better than it ought, but that was what it got. 73/100 and a bronze apple.
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